There are many kinds of hair clips known in the art, and disclosed, for example, in Japanese Utility Model Publication (unexamined) Nos.45-3321, 50-47698, 50-154195, 57-55403 and 61-174504. Those prior hair clips generally comprise a base plate fixed to an ornamental cover, a downwardly curved and band-shaped spring board whose both ends are slidably fixed to the base plate, and a band-shaped retainer operably disposed beneath the spring board. The retainer has a fixed end pivoted to a pair of brackets protruding from one end of the base plate, and also has a movable end formed with an engaging part which is releasably latched to a pair of hooks provided at the other end of the base plate.
These prior art hair clips retain hairs by and between the spring board and the retainer, with the engaging part thereof being held in place by the hooks.
However, these prior hair clips cannot be desirably used to retain a large mass of hairs, such as bunched hairs, because the hair clips are designed to retain hairs by and between the downwardly curved spring board and the retainer.
To retain a large mass of hairs between the downwardly curved spring board and the retainer, a space formed between the spring board and the retainer should be large enough to insert a large mass of hairs.
However, due to the downwardly curved spring board, the retainer needs to be rotated a large extent towards its open position to enlarge the space. Therefore, such a hair inserting operation is somewhat troublesome.
In addition, when a large mass of hairs is retained in the space with the engaging part held in place by the hooks, the downwardly curved spring board needs to be depressed according to the thickness of the hairs against the resilient force of the spring board. In this case, a larger pressure is required to depress the spring board, and the durability of the hair clip is declined because the spring board is subjected to excessive forces in the retained state.